Chemical oxygen-iodine laser

A chemical oxygen-iodine laser system for producing a beam of high energy coherent radiation comprising:

• a singlet molecular oxygen generating means for producing a gaseous flow of oxygen molecules in an excited state,
• an iodine monochloride generating means for producing a gaseous flow of iodine monochloride,
• mixing nozzles means for receiving gaseous reactants and discharging these reactants in a mixing flow,
• a singlet oxygen manifold means connected by conduit means to said singlet oxygen generating means and to said mixing nozzle means for providing a flow of gaseous singlet oxygen to said mixing nozzle means,
• an iodine monochloride manifold means connected to said iodine monochloride generating means and to said mixing nozzle means for providing a flow of gaseous iodine monochloride to said mixing nozzle means,
• laser cavity means formed by a sealed enclosure means connected to said mixing nozzle means for receiving flow of gaseous singlet oxygen and iodine monochloride from said mixing nozzle means, whereby iodine monochloride reactants with singlet oxygen to form atomic chlorine and atomic iodine and the atomic iodine formed subsequently reacts with singlet oxygen to raise the atomic iodine to a lasing state and permit the extraction of a laser beam from said laser cavity means, and
• exhaust manifold means connected to said laser cavity for extracting the reactants from said laser cavity.